Good-bye Maoriland

They left their Southern Lands,

They sailed across the sea;

They fought the Hun, they fought the Turk

For truth and liberty.

Now Anzac Day has come to stay,

And bring us sacred joy;

Though wooden crosses be swept away –

We’ll never forget our boys. – Jane Morison, ‘We’ll never forget our boys’, 1917

Be it ‘Tipperary’ or ‘Pokarekare’, the morning reveille or the bugle’s last post, concert parties at the front or patriotic songs at home, music was central to New Zealand’s experience of the First World War. In Good-Bye Maoriland, the acclaimed author of Blue Smoke: The Lost Dawn of New Zealand Popular Music introduces us the songs and sounds of World War I in order to take us deep inside the human experience of war.